Some Kinda Time! Benj Pasek and Justin Paul Revisit Dogfight and A Christmas Story at Joe's Pub

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16 May 2013

Lindsay Mendez

Photo by Monica Simoes

The score of Benj Pasek and Justin Paul's Lucille Lortel Award-winning musical Dogfight hit the Internet April 30; that same day the duo was nominated for a Tony Award for the Best Original Score of Broadway's A Christmas Story, the Musical. They celebrated May 15 at Joe's Pub.

"It's the craziest thing that the album came out on the same day as the Tony [nominations]," Pasek told Playbill.com at the Tony Awards press junket May 1, the day after the Dogfight album dropped on iTunes. "It feels like Christmas, if you will."

Paul added, "I feel like people are going to think we're pulling some sort of strings this year because they're [thinking], 'You have Dogfight and Christmas Story [make their New York debuts], and now the Tony nominations and the album come out at the same time!' This is all just happening by coincidence, but it's amazing."

Amazing might describe Pasek and Paul's May 15 evening at Joe's Pub, which celebrated the release of Dogfight and the recent success of Broadway's A Christmas Story. When the newly nominated songwriting duo took the stage at 9:30 PM in downtown Manhattan, the crowd erupted in cheers.

Cast members from the Second Stage Theatre summer 2012 production, including Lindsay Mendez and Derek Klena, who played the unlikely love interests Rose Fenny and Eddie Birdlace — and who will reunite May 28 as Wicked's newest Elphaba and Fiyero, respectively, on Broadway — joined Pasek and Paul to sing through the entirety of Dogfight, providing commentary and brief plot synopses in between songs.

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"Some Kinda Time" and "Hey, Good-Lookin'," featuring the group of Vietnam-bound soldiers — including original stars Nick Blaemire and Josh Segarra as well as Pasek on the mic and Paul on the piano — in search of the ugliest date to bring to the "Dogfight" on their final night before deployment, brought down the house early in the evening. Klena's smooth "Come to a Party" and Mendez's heartfelt "Nothing Short of Wonderful" followed, and Dogfight fans were transported to the 1963 diner where badass marine Eddie Birdlace first encounters the clumsy, yet charming Rose Fenny.